I managed to get my action replay for my PAL Play Station 2 to play American DVDs a couple of years ago, but now it doesn't seem to recognize my disks. I have the right region code saved, but it won't play any of my American DVDs like it did before. I thought I'd bring it up here on the off chance that any of the techno wizards of Suikosource know of a solution that can help me.

when i first got the action replay, it didn't play foreign dvds at all, then i found the region code and typed it in, saved it (I assumed it gets saved on the action replay memory card?) and it played American DVDs no problem. But when I tried using the action replay to play American DVDs yesterday, it came up with the message "Does not recognise your DVD player, do you want to enter the region code?" I chose yes, and the code was completely blank. So I typed it in, saved it, but it still won't play my American DVDs, it gives me the same message asking if I want to enter the region code again. The code is already entered when I open the code input screen.

OK, it sounds like you're using it right. Unfortunately, it's difficult to say, and you may just have to play around with it until it either works or breaks down completely. Try going into the PS2 Browser with the AR dongle plugged in, and see if it can be read without a bunch of corrupt data or bad sectors.

Datel's memory cards are hit and miss. If you open one up, it will either be semi-OK or a rat's nest of jumpers and components. I can't use my AR Max anymore (not that I ever did much) because I got one with a poor build quality. Out of something like 20 memory cards I have kicking around, all Sony manufactured aside from the two that came with the AR Max, the required AR dongle is the only one that has stopped working.

Seems like my AR card has lost its marbles, then. I just looked through all my game codes, and all the codes I entered for games manually, including Suikoden 4, 5 and Tactics, are completely gone, just like the region code I entered for playing foreign DVDs. Only the game codes that already came with the software have remained. I also tried doing what you suggested - starting the PS2 with the card inserted - and my controller wouldn't even function properly, is that likely to be a related troubleshot?

My PS2 did the same thing with the AR card inserted. Unplugging the controller and plugging it back in made it start responding. I don't know what the cause was. If I had to guess, I'd say something about the way the card responds to the BIOS's IOP setup knocks the controller port offline somehow.